A Weekend is One Thing and a Thing Later

Lee Hodge

After Robert Gober

I saw a lady silhouette on a truck’s mud flap and a
Missing cat notice written from the perspective of the cat
I’m lost before the shape of you in the rearview mirror
My mother was telling the sales woman in Talbots about her court date
While a tree was falling on the lawn
Of the former Home for Confederate Widows
After watching golf on the liquid crystal display
Studded and picturesque with prefallen trees
We read the plaque on the raptor trail for Bill Patrick
Who dedicated his life to birds of prey
Which are majestic creatures
Then the fake diamond earring of the man
Next to me on the greyhound bus
Gleamed in the smell of piss
I took half a pink pill and
The 7 Eleven parking lot
Next to the old 7 Eleven parking lot dissolves jagged
It was raining before
The woman was pulling her dog
Out through the mist of evaporating water
Dissipating in the brightness of the morning
Which is the day coming on timeless
In the space of the storm last night of the morning
I was waking to work and saw the notice again
I’m lost! I was last seen Sunday
I am sure you are cool but I would much rather be home
Help me! Please
Please
I’m lost!

Lee Hodge is an MFA candidate in poetry and fiction at Virginia Commonwealth University, and a recipient of a 2019 Carol Weinstein Grant. Her work has appeared in Clinch Mountain Review and Funny Looking Dog Quarterly. She lives in Richmond, Virginia.